Malaya gaurding Pelambang, Feb '42.

I'll find some ATL success for Force Z and ABDA if it bloody-well kills me.

The twin PoDs for this are the appointment of a better General than Percival and a better Admiral than Phillips (both with Med/African experience). The TTL General trains his troops better and uses them more effectively in a series of delaying/attrition engagements. Greater numbers of men/units and fighting defensively on familiar terrain makes up for the Japanese superiority in the air and in tanks. The result is that the original Japanese forces' advance runs out of steam and a line is formed along the Maur river through the mountains of Besar and Bekok to Endau on Feb the 13th. Meanwhile the TTL Admiral, being much more realistic, keeps Force Z intact and graudally RN, RAN and Dutch naval units coalesce around the core of Force Z.

However the Japanese are on a fixed timetable and the planned invasion of Palembang goes ahead on shedule. A parachute assault of 180 men was made and suffered heavy casualties but had some success on the 13th Feb. On the 15th of Feb 14 invasion transports, escorted by a heavy cruiser and 4 destroyers and covered by the light carrier Ryujo, 4 heavy and 1 light cruiser and 3 destroyers plus some IJN and IJAAF land based planes, is moving toward Sumatra. This convoy is intercepted by the Force Z/ABDA task force of PoW & Repulse, Exeter, Hobart, 3 Dutch light cruisers and about 12-15 destroyers, plus air units operating from Singapore (including a bomber group which IOTL when operating from Sumatra achieved a measure of success against the invasion convoy).

What happens next? I assume that the airforces in Sth Malaya/Singapore would occupy most of the Japanese land based airpower, so the supporting roles of these would be minimal. Nagumo isn't in the picture for at least 4 more days, bombing Darwin on the 19th.

Can the 14 Vals and 22 Zeros on the Ryujo, the 5 cruisers and 7 destroyers plus some extra land based aircraft stop 2 captial ships, 5 cruisers and 12-15 destroyers from destroying the convoy? Or do they abandon their timetable and wait 4 or more days for Nagumo, so he can destroy this ABDA task force, assuming they know about it? How would postponement affect the March 1st plans for dual invasion of Java and the new, pressing need for shipping to send reinforcements to Malaya?
 

bard32

Banned
Well, that could have been a possibility had not Churchill denuded his forces in
Southeast Asia for other fronts, including North Africa, and the Mediterranean.
This unfortunate circumstance was responsible for the loss of the British
battleship Prince of Wales, and British battlecruiser Repulse, to
Japanese airpower.
 
Sure the defences of Malaya were far from perfect but they were also far from impotent. Percival had 4-5 divisions to the Japanese 2-3 and was fighting on the defensive in close country. He should have been able to cope with Japanese inferiority in troops but superiority in tanks and aircraft. But the troops were poorly trained, field defenes weren't prepared (bad for civilian morale!) the fighting was poorly handled during the campaign. Similarly Phillips sailed right into the Japanese AO which was bound to be supported by aircraft. Even with the ignorance of the IJN land-based torpedo planes' particular capabilities the RN had faced a lot of land-based torpedo and medium bomber attacks in the Med. Phillips did what I doubt someone with that experience would do, blithely sailed out of his own air cover and into the enemy's.

But beyond that. What about the invasion of Sumatra if Malaya was still a fighting concern on Feb 15th and the OTL abortive ABDA force beefed up by Force Z? Could the OTL escort & covering forces defeat ForceZ/ABDA, or would it withstand the air attacks and still destroy the convoy? Without a Japanese-occupied Sumatra at it's back how would the Japanese efforts to take Singapore go?
 

bard32

Banned
That's right. However, it's a myth that the guns of Malaya only pointed out to
sea. The Japanese made the trek to Malaya, and by extension, Singapore,
through the jungle. They actually rode bicycles and when the tires got flat, they rode on the rims and that really unnerved the British defenders.
 
The big guns had about 270deg traverse and had stops inserted to keep the electric firing mechanisms from being ripped out by over-rotation. But in this scenario the guns were useless since the front lines are about 150km from Singapore and I doubt the IJN ship would steam into range of them.
 
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